Congratulations, You Woke Up—Now Pay Up

Modern life in America has a terrifying subscription fee: stay alive, keep working, keep paying—and pray that nothing expensive breaks before your next paycheck.

Congratulations. You woke up.

That will cost you.

I am not joking. Open your eyes in modern America and the meter is already running. Before I stretch my legs, before I brush my teeth, before I decide whether today is going to be wonderful or another slow-motion financial mugging, somebody somewhere has a hand in my pocket.

Good morning.

Now pay up.

The bedroom I woke up in costs money. Rent or mortgage. Pick your poison. The electricity that kept the room warm or cool overnight costs money. The water waiting behind the bathroom faucet costs money. The phone glowing beside my bed costs money. The internet carrying bad news into that phone costs money.

I have not eaten breakfast yet. Nobody cares. The bill collectors have already eaten. That is the strange comedy of modern life in America. We are told to chase happiness, build relationships, raise children, improve ourselves, exercise, travel, save for retirement and “live our best lives.”

Wonderful.

First, Visa would like a word.

I sometimes imagine modern life in America as a nightclub with a huge bouncer standing at the entrance.

“Where are you going?”

“To live.”

“Cover charge.”

“How much?”

“Everything you’ve got.”

That sounds dramatic until I look at the numbers.

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that the average American consumer unit spent $78,535 in 2024. Housing alone averaged $26,266. Transportation took another $13,318. Food swallowed $10,169. Those 3 basic categories came to almost $50,000 before countless other expenses entered the room.

Think about that.

I need somewhere to sleep.

Pay.

I need something to eat.

Pay.

I need to get to work so I can earn the money required to keep paying.

Pay again.

That last part deserves applause. We have built an economic machine so clever that I may have to spend thousands of dollars every year simply to reach the place where I earn the money I need to spend thousands of dollars every year.

Transportation averaged $13,318 in 2024. There is poetry in that. Dark poetry. I buy the car to get to work. I work to make the car payment. I buy gasoline to move the car. I insure the car because something might happen to it. I maintain the car because something definitely will happen to it.

Then one morning the dashboard lights up. Check engine. Two words. Financial horror movie. The mechanic looks at me with that calm face mechanics develop after years of watching grown adults receive terrible news.

“We found the problem.”

Wonderful.

“How much?”

He pauses.

I know immediately that my weekend plans are dead.

This is why I laugh whenever somebody tells struggling Americans that financial security is simply about “better budgeting.”

Budget what?

Sometimes the numbers simply do not cooperate. The Federal Reserve reported that in 2025 only 63% of adults said they could cover an unexpected $400 expense entirely with cash, savings, or a credit card paid off at the next statement. Another 12% said they could not cover the $400 expense by any method.

That is not some imaginary disaster.

$400 can be tires.

$400 can be plumbing.

$400 can be an emergency dental visit.

$400 can be the sound your washing machine makes right before it decides it has washed its last sock.

For millions of people, financial disaster does not arrive wearing a black cape. It arrives as an invoice. Then comes food. Food has one particularly nasty business model: I keep needing it. I ate yesterday. My stomach does not care. Apparently, yesterday's chicken has expired as a financial achievement.

By noon today, my body will send another collection notice.

“Payment due.”

The USDA reported that food-at-home prices increased 2.3% in 2025 after years of earlier increases, including a brutal 11.4% jump in 2022. By May 2026, the USDA's monthly food plans estimated that a male aged 20–50 in a 4-person household would require about $316 per month under its low-cost food plan and $397 under its moderate-cost plan. For a female aged 20–50, the corresponding amounts were about $275 and $336. The USDA even recommends increasing individual estimates by 20% for a person living alone.

Translation?

Even eating carefully has a cover charge. Walk through a supermarket and watch the little financial decisions firing inside my head. Do I need this? Can I buy the cheaper version? Is that chicken really worth that? Why are eggs acting like luxury jewelry?

Put it back.

Pick it up.

Put it back again.

Welcome to the modern grocery store, where dinner sometimes feels like a negotiation with kidnappers.

And history tells me this struggle is nothing new. Industrial capitalism dramatically improved living standards in America, created enormous wealth and made goods available on a scale previous generations could barely imagine. But it also tied ordinary life tightly to wages and markets. As societies urbanized, millions of people stopped producing much of what they consumed directly. Housing, transportation, food, fuel and services increasingly arrived through cash transactions.

The bargain was simple.

Specialization made society richer.

Dependence made the individual more exposed.

I am originally from Nigeria, and before I came to America, my parents, grandparents, and great-great-grandparents grew some of their own food. Today, I can order mine through an app while sitting on a sofa financed over 24 months.

Progress?

Absolutely.

Freedom?

That depends on whether the payment clears.

Housing delivers the hardest punch because everybody has to exist somewhere. There is no legal button marked “temporarily stop occupying physical space.” The Bureau of Labor Statistics found that housing remained the largest household spending category in 2023, consuming 32.9 cents of every dollar spent by the typical consumer unit. Transportation took another 17.0 cents and food another 12.9 cents. Together, housing, transportation and food accounted for 62.8 cents of every dollar spent. Add healthcare and personal insurance and pensions, and the 5 largest categories consumed 83.2 cents of every dollar.

Read that again.

Before entertainment.

Before vacations.

Before designer shoes.

Before that ridiculous $8 coffee people love blaming for everybody's financial problems.

Most of the money was already spoken for.

This is why I reject the cartoon version of financial struggle that says everybody who feels squeezed must be irresponsible. Some people are irresponsible. Of course they are. Some people buy nonsense. Some people carry $1,400 phones while complaining about being broke. Some people treat credit cards like magical rectangles containing free money.

Call a spade a spade.

Bad decisions matter.

But so does arithmetic.

When housing, transportation, food, healthcare and other necessities eat enormous portions of household spending, telling everybody to cancel Netflix is like telling passengers on the Titanic to save the ship by drinking less water.

Useful?

Maybe.

Decisive?

Please.

Then there are children. Beautiful little miracles. Also astonishingly effective expense-generating machines. Food. Clothes. School supplies. Childcare. Medical expenses. Activities. Shoes that somehow become too small 14 minutes after I buy them. The Federal Reserve found that among parents who paid for childcare in 2023, the typical monthly childcare bill amounted to 50%–70% of their monthly housing payment.

Imagine that conversation.

“Congratulations! You have a beautiful baby.”

“Thank you.”

“Here is your second housing payment.”

The joke writes itself.

Then adulthood keeps adding subscriptions to existence.

Insurance.

Utilities.

Taxes.

Repairs.

Phone service.

Internet service.

Medical care.

Prescriptions.

Transportation.

Education.

Retirement.

I am told to save for emergencies while paying for current emergencies and preparing financially for emergencies that have not happened yet. That is adulthood. I am essentially paying yesterday, today and tomorrow at the same time. And heaven help me if I become sick. My body can malfunction without checking my bank balance first. That is the ultimate insult. The machine I live inside can break, and then I have to pay another human being to investigate why my own organs have started a rebellion.

Modern medicine can perform miracles. The invoice can perform one too. It can make money disappear.

This does not mean modern life is worse than life 200 years ago. I am not romanticizing cholera, child mortality, famine, dangerous factories, primitive surgery or houses without electricity. Anyone who thinks the past was cheap should remember that sometimes people paid with something more valuable than money.

They paid with years of life. Modern society has given me comforts kings once lacked. Running water. Electricity. Antibiotics. Instant communication. Air conditioning. Cars. Commercial aviation. Supermarkets overflowing with food.

The problem is not that these things exist. The problem is that almost every layer of modern comfort comes attached to another financial obligation. The miracle has a monthly payment. That is the contradiction. I am richer in technology than emperors were. Yet one broken transmission can ruin my month. I can video-call somebody 6,000 miles away while worrying whether my checking account can survive until Friday. I can carry nearly all human knowledge in my pocket, but the pocket itself may contain a phone I am still paying off. We call this prosperity. Sometimes it is. Sometimes it feels like prosperity rented by the month.

And the machine never sleeps. That is the part I find fascinating.

I sleep.

Interest does not.

I take Sunday off.

My rent does not.

I go on vacation.

My electric bill stays home and keeps working.

My subscriptions do not become sentimental because I am tired.

Nobody at the insurance company says, “He has had a difficult week. Forget August.”

No.

August would like its money.

September is already warming up in the hallway.

This is why waking up in America is the perfect metaphor for modern economic life. The instant consciousness returns, obligations return with it.

I open my eyes.

Rent.

I turn on the light.

Electricity.

I brush my teeth.

Water.

Toothpaste.

I make breakfast.

Groceries.

I drive.

Car payment.

Insurance.

Fuel.

Maintenance.

I arrive at work.

Taxes.

I come home exhausted and turn on the television.

Subscription.

I finally climb into bed.

Rent.

Then somebody tells me I should relax. Relax? Is that free? Because if it is free, somebody is probably developing an app to fix that.

Tomorrow morning my alarm will ring again. I will open my eyes. For approximately 3 beautiful seconds, I will belong entirely to myself. Then reality will clear its throat.

“Good morning.”

I know that voice.

“What do you want?”

Reality smiles.

“Payment.”

And there it is.

The great recurring invoice called life.

Congratulations. I woke up.

Now pay up.

 

If you’re looking for something different to read, some of the titles in my “Brief Book Series” is available on Google Play Books. You can also read them here on Google Play, or in Barnes & Noble bookstore: Brief Book Series.